First 3D Ultrasound

Week 21 began right after going to our very first 3D ultrasound. It was neat to see our babies faces in 3D, even if they weren't very clear images. The company (UCBaby) offered us a follow up scan in three weeks(on October 7th) since they couldn't get really good photos because the babies were hiding behind each other and also behind their placentas. We will get better images and a DVD at that time. Our parents will also be able to watch live over the internet again, which is really nice. Here are the two 3D photos that we have of our cubs so far. Cute little faces!

Baby A - It's a Girl!

Baby B - It's a Boy!

The technician also took photos of the babies in 2D and images of their faces, hearts and their little bums. We're so happy to see that our babies are doing well and are growing stronger with each passing week. Everyday is a blessing and we are so very thankful to have life be so wonderful. We haven't yet gotten used to the idea that we are going to have a daughter, or a son for that matter. I have no idea when it will sink in. We keep on praying for a continued good pregnancy and healthy birth for our little cubs. We look forward to meeting them in early 2012! Can't wait to see their beautiful little faces in person and to hear them cry will just be amazing. I can only imagine.

This weekend DH spent almost all of his time working on the basement development. He framed around the duct work in the ceiling area and built a 2x4 wall to divide crawl space from the part of the basement which we will be developing into an office and a rec/living room.. Or a rumpus room as my german grandparents would call it. I think I'm going to call it that from now on. He just needs to finish the duct boxes and frame for the laundry room wall. That will be an October project. Then he can move on to running the electrical and we can hire a drywaller to come and drywall the walls and ceilings. It's going to look so great. I'm proud of DH!

Also this past weekend, my Mom & I went fabric shopping to get the same fabrics we'd bought last week, in yellow and green, in a pink & purple. She is going to make our daughter the same quilt pattern, but in pinks! It's going to be such a comfy nursery and knowing it's made with love makes it all that much better. I've been working on crocheting a pink fuzzy baby blanket to with the blue one I'd made a few years back. This weekend I realized I was making the pink one too large! I unravelled it all and started again. It looks much better now and I've already redone one out of the three balls of wool. I suspect it will be finished soon. I also spent some time organizing our babies' things into their freshly painted closet. I hung all of the clothes (since we don't have their dresser yet) and put all of their smaller items into wicker baskets for each of them. Yes, I think this must be what nesting is.

Wool for the baby blanket I am currently making - Red Heart's Pink Lemonade 

The blue blanket I made a few years ago - Red Heart's Playtime

The end of this week, we are leaving for Thompson! (Yay, a vacation!) We are travelling with my parents and are going back to my home town to visit my Grandma. It will be wonderful to see her again, as it's been a year and a half since she came to our wedding reception and it's been over 5 years since I've been home. She will also be so thrilled to see my belly bump. She is just over the moon that she is (finally) going to be a Great-Grandma! (She calls our cubs a "mixture". Meaning a girl and a boy. Which I find endearing.) I also plan to visit a few friends and see what's changed in town. We'll be going to the lake and stopping enroute to visit the waterfall. Oh, and of course, I'll be going to eat homemade burgers and fries at Popeyes by the river if it's not closed for the season! That's about all I'm planning to do. That, relaxing, and listening to stories my Grandma tells about the old days back in Germany.

This weeks' belly pic at 21 weeks along.

Nursery Colours (Week 20)

We spent this past weekend doing home improvement projects for our babies. My Mom & I spent about three hours, one evening, at a local fabric store called My Sewing Room. We were looking at cute fabrics and trying to piece together a theme and colour idea. (The wall paint colour depended upon our choices.) We ended up buying a bunch of things, and like always I over estimated and we got so much fabric that we could likely outfit two rooms with it all! The main fabric we chose is called Newton's Dream, which has little cartoon animals on it - primarily a sheep called Newton, and then some bears, frogs and what I think may be hedgehogs but I am not completely certain. To go with it, we picked out some basic star fabrics and some beautiful turquoise blue fabric.

Our room fabrics - Selected by my Mom & myself.

 As previously mentioned, my Mom has generously offered to make us the entire bedroom set for our little cubs. She has already started cutting the fabrics for a quilt for the babies' crib. She also will sew a matching crib skirt and window valance. Lastly we picked out some lighter fabric (not shown) that she will magically turn into crib sheets. For my own contributions, I have bought a crib mobile, which I plan to disassemble and cover with the same room fabrics. I had hoped to find a remote controlled mobile, but no luck. I plan to hang some matching handmade characters from the mobile, which I found on Etsy and will post photos once it comes together. I am also planning to make a custom a lamp shade and just need to find a nice little lamp. My last project is to find a suitable cloth hamper and customize the outside in some fashion. I really look forward to seeing it all together. In the meantime I am crocheting another baby blanket to match a blue one, with white trim, which I crafted a few years ago in a fluffy wool. The one currently underway is the same wool in pink, with white trim.

Our nursery is now painted, thanks to DH and my Dad, and it looks fabulous! It's a teal blue colour with a darker teal feature wall, where the crib (or cribs, eventually, if there is enough room) will be placed. I think the cherry furniture will look great in front of the wall colour. Hoping it will arrive sooner than later. For now I just love to sit in our freshly painted nursery and admire the future.

Our nursery - Vibrant Teal Blue. The Photo doesn't do it justice.

This upcoming weekend we will be working on starting the basement. A long overdue project to give us some extra living space. Currently it is a concrete floor with insulated walls - not conducive to babies or baby living space. DH is planning to frame out the dividing walls and possibly get a start on the electrical work. This will be a winter project to get it all finished, and he wants to have it suitable for our cubs. The home renos continue..and the list never seems to get any shorter!

Yet again, a weekly photo update of my belly. I like watching it grow. It lets me know that all must be well if it is getting larger. Also, this is likely one of the few times in my life when I'll be able to have a nice big round belly and not worry in the least about if people think I'm "just fat". Plus - yes it gets better - I can eat what I please (within reason) and say things like "It's our babies who are hungry, not me." I get a lot of yummy things this way - almost all guilt free..

20 weeks along

Later this week I should be able to post some 3D ultrasound photos from our scan on Friday. Perhaps even a video - if blogger allows it. Now I'm off to bed to listen to our cubs' heartbeats before getting a full night's sleep! (Yes, I shall enjoy it while I can..)

Beginnings of a Nursery

Last weekend we decided to go baby furniture shopping! We had browsed around a little bit at some local stores and researched online some of the items we wanted to purchase. We ended up ordering a crib, dresser and bookshelf for the babies' nursery from Bo Bebe. We picked the Volterra collection from the Pali-Design line of furniture in vintage cherry colour. I'll post some photos once we get them all set up. It takes 8-12 weeks for the furniture to arrive, so we expect to be setting up our nursery sometime between early November and early December.

We also went to Kacz Kids and bought our stroller. DH was excited to pick out a stroller. We decided to go with the City Select by Baby Jogger. Mostly because it was one of the very few choices of stroller which allow for two infant carriers to be attached and therefore (hopefully) making it a bit easier to get our babes in and out of the truck, to the stroller and into the mall/house/wherever. The stroller also is very convertible and allows for two seats to be put into place (in any direction) for when they are too big for their infant car seats. One seat comes with the stroller and then you can purchase a second seat. We bought the onyx stroller and added an amethyst second seat. (I still think we may be having a boy and a girl - and if not, the amethyst is a nice dark purple, just in case it is two little boys.) Also, you can convert this stroller to be just one seat and can take one baby separately to the store if you wanted to. (Or use it for future children..) It also fits through doorways and is quite light, both good things. We basically had to buy every part and attachment that is offered for the City Select in order to use it for twins, but so far we love it! It rides so smoothly and we can't wait to take it out with our fat little cubs in it. The only thing DH is missing is a cup holder for his Starbucks..

Our new City Select stroller!

Of course to go with the stroller, we had to buy infant car seats (some people call them infant carriers - I like to refer to them as buckets). We read a ton of reviews and talked to friends to see what they had used, and what they liked about them. We decided to go with the Peg Perego SIP seats. They have a metal frame as opposed to the plastic frames of most of the other brands we looked at. Also, no one we talked to had anything bad to say about the seats, other than they were a bit on the heavier side. (Big arm muscles here I come!) We picked out the Viaggo SIP models from their 2011 line and are really happy with how they look. They have brown leather on them (DH's choice - to match our truck interior..) which I think will be easier to wipe clean and will likely be much more temperature regulating than the cloth models. The cost difference between the cloth vs. the leather.. was only a mere $20. So it was a very easy choice. Like I mentioned we bought every extra piece for the stroller, and two of those pieces were to attach the Peg Peregos to the stroller base. I really hope our babies like their buckets.

Peg Perego buckets for our tiny humans!

This week not too much has happened in the way of medical appointments or anything too fun. We are so thankful that our cubs are doing well and we listen to their heartbeats a few times a week with our at home fetal doppler. At some point, once they're big enough and we can get a steady reading, I'd like to record a video of their hearts beating on the doppler and post it here as well. I will work on that.

One week to go until our 3D ultrasound at UCBaby! Our parents are going to be able to watch the ultrasound live via the internet, which I find really neat. I am sure that they will as well. Perhaps we will be able to get a good look at the babies' facial features and see who they look most like so far. We also are going to see if we can find out their genders this time around. The UCBaby staff told me to eat something sweet 15 minutes before our scan (the office is located right across the street from Crave Cupcakes - done & done!). I think this is to get the babies moving about in a sugar high, so hopefully they'll be bouncing around and we can get a peek at their bums!

Tonight my parents are coming in to the city and my Mom and I will be going to the fabric store to buy a bunch more baby fabrics. She is going to make our babies' bedroom set! (Two crib quilts, multiple crib sheets, a matching bed skirt and valance all handmade.) It is going to be so beautiful. I'll post photos of it all together once the furniture arrives. I really adore that my Mom can have such a big part in their lives and a connection to their nursery where they will fall asleep surrounded by family love. I know she is excited to be a Grandmother. She will never truly understand how much this contribution means to us, but we'll try to show her.

While my Mom and I shop fabric and piece together a baby room, my Dad and DH will be painting the nursery walls. It's great that my Dad can make a contribution to their nursery too. He loves doing home reno stuff, so this is right up his alley. Plus he's really good at it, so I know the walls won't be all drippy. We went out last night and got a bunch of paint swatches from Lowes, then taped them to the walls. Today, our job is to narrow down the colours. So far it's looking like we may go with a light green or a teal blue. (DH kiboshed purple as being "too girly".) We are trying to be gender neutral yet we still want it to have a fresh, happy feeling in the room. We've been peeking in every once in awhile to see the swatches in different lighting over the course of the day. Also, the colour will be affected by the fabrics we select, so tomorrow is final decision day!

Lastly, I wanted to post another belly photo. This one was taken at work after a workout on the elliptical. I was so happy to still be able to fit into my Lululemon gear - though they are getting a teeny bit tighter..

Week 19 Belly

Anatomy Ultrasound!

Week 17 passed by rather quickly. We spent the week waiting anxiously for our 18-20 week ultrasound which was scheduled for the follwoing Tuesday morning. I went for another odd numbered week massage, (It was so very nice and relaxing), and spent some time at my orthodontist getting new retainers made. We're not putting braces back on just yet. (..but that has nothing to do with babies! so moving along..)

Week 18 has been wonderful. On Tuesday August 30th we got another ultrasound and this time it was the anatomy scan. The technician checked each baby over very carefully and measured what seemed to be every square inch of their teeny bodies. She even looked at all of their organs. Then we waited while the Radiologist went over the ultrasound images. They told us that everything looked great and that the babies, whom I lovingly refer to as "The Cubs", measured right along with 19 weeks. (They still think I am a week ahead. Silly doctors.) We asked to find out the babies' genders, but were told that they were both in a position which was hiding their bums. Sneeky little Cubs! These are definitely my kids, very stubborn.

Both babies were in a breech position, with their heads up by my ribs and their feet down by my pelvis. They were spooning and looks so happy in there. Baby A had a heartbeat of 153, and baby B had a heartbeat of 150. We are still guessing boy/girl, but who knows we may just be surprised.

We were delighted to hear the healthy update and went out to CharCut (a fancy restaurant here in the city) for a celebratory lunch date. It was really nice to spend some quality time with DH.

 I also found out, from the ultrasound technician, that there are companies which will do 3D scans and broadcast it to 8 email addresses live, so people from out of town can watch right along. They can also tell you the genders if you like, so we will try once again. I called the company to see when they normally do twin scans. Turns out it's best between weeks 21-24, while the babies still have space to move about. Since we are going to be gone end of September for 10 days to visit family, we booked an appointment for Friday September 16th. We will either be in week 20 or week 21. I'm excited to be able to see them again so soon, yet I really don't want ultrasounds to harm our babies. Though I'm told that they don't, I still worry for them. It will be very nice to experience a 3D ultrasound though and get some more photos, also to be able to bring the photos to show my Grandma the next week.


18 weeks

Through everything, I continue to talk to our babies and tell them to keep their hearts beating and to keep on growing big and strong. I see them in there, I'm getting a big belly and I hear their heartbeats at home with the fetal doppler... yet I still don't believe this is real! I'm so very thankful for both of our precious cubs. If they're anything like me and stubborn, they'll end up being 8lbs each and born in February, just because they don't want to come out..